Don't Even Say It

It might be foolish to heap a little scorn on Microsoft, but foolishness calls for foolishness, so what the hell? On the MSN homepage today was a link to their "Lifestyle" page which contained a list of things women should "never, ever say to a guy." In all fairness to Bill Gates, the "article" came with a Glamour magazine logo and the subheading, "we asked men to spill the details on the phrases guys dread." My suspicions are that the whole thing was concocted by some 20-year-old Glamour intern, reflecting her idea of what verbiage would send a guy into a tizzy; if not, if real (sic) men were indeed consulted, it must have been done at a take-out quiche joint--real men don't tizzy.

Read the entire list here, but among the supposed verbal atom bombs the piece warns women against deploying on men are such inanities as "Can you TiVo the game? I need to watch the finale of The Bachelor live." If a guy "dreads" this phrase, he's either as soulless as she or doesn't know an open invitation to spend the evening at a sports bar when it hits him over the head. How about, "Maybe you should pick up some Rogaine"? Guys know the condition of their pates, trust me. If he's been thinking about Rogaine, he'll thank you for the confirmation. If he's not, he'll just laugh, thinking it funny that someone else gives more of a damn about his hair than he does. But be warned: men know the names of some image-enhancing products too, and if he's in a feisty mood, he might consider the door open to make comments along the lines of, "Okay, let's go to Walgreens and while we're at it we can pick up some _______ or ________ for you." Let's see who's full of dread now. One of the "dreaded" phrases that really cracks me up is accompanied by this photo:

"I really wish you'd shave your back." Seems to me the MSN art department could find a picture of a man who just might have a whisker or two of visible body hair to illustrate this damning quip. But really, even if a man has abundant back hair, there are about five million phrases he dreads more than this one. "Fine, I can't see it or reach it, so if it really bothers you, lather me up and go to it. It's no skin off my back, I hope."

Look, let's get real here. Men are narcissistic ego-maniacs, but we're not wimps. It takes a little more than the type of petty digs the article lists to raise our hackles. You want to get a man ticked? Tell him his lawn needs mowing. Guys have a sensitive internal clock that tells them the exact time to cut the grass. Don't mess with it. "Are you going to shower today?" Well, "today" might be a little too constricting, but, yes, I do intend to shower again in the future. "What are you thinking?" Well, whatever it was, it's now been replaced by thinking how in the hell I'm going to answer that question. "Do you have to spit?" Duh (though beware, if you phrase the question, "Do you have to spit like that?" the man may not pick up on the tone of admonition and instead hear it as a more inquisitive statement: "Well, no, I can also spit like this, and like this, and ..."). But the king of them all, no doubt, is this one: "Would it bug you if I said ..." Men are either bugged or not; they don't think about it, which really bugs them. Which is why MSN/Glamour has really bugged me today.